Current Conflicts: And Then What?
Russia, Iran ..
“For man, when perfected, is the best of animals, but, when separated from law and justice, he is the worst of all; since armed injustice is the more dangerous, and he is equipped at birth with arms, meant to be used by intelligence and virtue” Aristotle, Politics 1.2, 1253a31–39
The Muscovite Mafia State, led by gangster in chief Putin, is armed injustice incarnate. That is why it garners ever greater enmity and will end more or less like the Third Reich did.
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Aristotle, Confucius, and Hobbes all faced the problem of trying to restore order to a polity shattered by war.
Currently, we see such wars shattering Ukraine, Russia, and Iran. It is worth revisiting their thoughts so we can understand how to impose order after Russia completely collapses and the Iranian regime is replaced. Those governments are unsustainable because violent repression, corruption, and superstition are poor governance tools that engender resistance.
First, let’s consider what those three great thinkers actually said. Then, how they fit together to provide plans for durable peace to end war, prevent war, and build a peaceful prosperous stable political order.
Hobbes
Quae igitur sunt consequentia temporis belli, ubi quisque hostis est cuique; eadem sunt etiam consequentia temporis, quo homines vivunt sine alia securitate, quam quae propria singulorum potentia et inventio suppeditare potest. In tali conditione nullus est industriae locus, quia incertus est eius fructus; et consequenter nulla cultura agri; nulla navigatio, neque usus commodorum quae mari importari possunt; nulla commoda aedificia; nulla instrumenta movendis et transferendis rebus quae multam vim requirunt; nulla faciei terrae cognitio; nullum temporis supputatio; nullae artes; nullae litterae; nulla societas; et quod omnium pessimum, perpetuus metus et periculum mortis violentae; vitaque hominis solitaria, pauper, acerba, ferina, brevis.
“Hereby it is manifest, that during the time men live without a common Power to keep them all in awe, they are in that condition which is called Warre; and such a warre, as is of every man, against every man.
For WARRE, consisteth not in Battell onely, or the act of fighting; but in a tract of time, wherein the Will to contend by Battell is sufficiently known: and therefore the notion of Time, is to be considered in the nature of Warre; as it is in the nature of Weather. For as the nature of Foule weather, lyeth not in a showre or two of rain; but in an inclination thereto of many dayes together: So the nature of War, consisteth not in actuall fighting; but in the known disposition thereto, during all the time there is no assurance to the contrary. All other time is PEACE.
Whatsoever therefore is consequent to a time of Warre, where every man is Enemy to every man; the same is consequent to the time, wherein men live without other security, than what their own strength, and their own invention shall furnish them withall. In such condition, there is no place for Industry; because the fruit thereof is uncertain: and consequently no Culture of the Earth; no Navigation, nor use of the commodities that may be imported by Sea; no commodious Building; no Instruments of moving, and removing such things as require much force; no Knowledge of the face of the Earth; no account of Time; no Arts; no Letters; no Society; and which is worst of all, continuall feare, and danger of violent death; And the life of man, solitary, poore, nasty, brutish, and short.” —Thomas Hobbes, Leviathan, I.xiii (1651).
Master Kong (Confucius)
致知在格物。物格而后知至，知至而后意诚，意诚而后心正，心正而后身修，身修而后家齐，家齐而后国治，国治而后天下平。
Zhì zhī zài gé wù… guó zhì ér hòu tiānxià píng.
“The extension of knowledge lies in investigating things… When knowledge is attained, intentions become sincere; when intentions are sincere, the mind is rectified; when the mind is rectified, the person is cultivated; cultivated persons regulate their families; regulated families bring order to the state; and ordered states bring peace to all under Heaven.” --Master Kong aka Confucius.
Aristotle
ὁ δὲ ἄπολις διὰ φύσιν καὶ οὐ διὰ τύχην ἤτοι φαῦλός ἐστιν ἢ κρείττων ἢ ἄνθρωπος, ὥσπερ καὶ ὁ ὑφ’ Ὁμήρου λοιδορηθεὶς “ἀφρήτωρ ἀθέμιστος ἀνέστιος”: ἅμα γὰρ φύσει τοιοῦτος καὶ πολέμου ἐπιθυμητής, ἅτε ἄζυγος ὥσπερ ἐν πεττοῖς.
“But he who is without a State by nature and not by chance is either inferior or more than a human being—like the man reviled by Homer as ‘clanless, lawless, homeless’; for such a one at the same time by nature desires war, being isolated, like a pawn in a game” -Aristotle, Politics, Book I, chapter 2, 1253a (1253a1–18), trans. Benjamin Jowett (1885). Q.v., Iliad 9.63–64
Aristotle, Confucius, and Hobbes confront the same fundamental political problem: how human beings restore order to the violence and disintegration that followed when no stable order bound them together.
Hobbes starts with the extreme case. Where there is no common power to restrain mutual fear, war exists not only in battle but in the settled expectation of violence; industry, culture, knowledge, and society itself become insecure. His remedy? A public power strong enough to establish peace: “A common Power to keep them all in Awe”.
Yet, Hobbesian authority alone explains only how order is imposed. Hobbes does not explain how the order imposed becomes self-sustaining, say for example through peer enforcement, emulation, and replication. Confucius supplies the missing moral sequence: knowledge leads to truth. Truth leads to self-improvement. Self-improvement leads to a better human character. A better human character leads to ordered families. Ordered families lead to peace for all. Peace is not mere force. Peace grows outward from disciplined persons and exemplary rulers mutually inspiring each other to improvement.
Aristotle shows us why neither solitary independence nor mere private strength can fulfill human nature. Man without political community is a “clanless, lawless, homeless,” beast and thus inclined toward war. The State is necessary because human beings require law, shared judgment, and civic association. But like Confucius, Aristotle sees the final authority that is state power serves not only to secure the means for survival it also denizens to pursue and enjoy a good life.
Taken together, the three thinkers yield a layered theory of political restoration. Hobbes teaches that peace requires security; Confucius teaches that security requires moral cultivation; Aristotle teaches that cultivation finds its proper completion in a political community ordered toward justice and human well-being. A shattered polity is restored, then, not only by coercion, which might lack virtue nor by virtue without institutions, but by a lawful common power and a populace and rulers capable of self-discipline, reciprocal obligation, and seeking the common good.
And then what?
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